South India update

It rained today - well a few drops anyway! Humidity 90-100% so we are here in a cool internet cafe taking a break.
We had a great stay in Periyar Tiger Reserve - no tigers and precious little wild life but a beautiful hotel and the early morning walk in the reserve was lovely; as was a boat trip on the manmade lake there (48 square Km). This was constructed by the British as a leisure/fishing place and we saw nesting cormorants, otters, turtles, deer and a water snake! Then we drove to the Kerala back waters - a maze of natural and man made waterways with some very large lakes and rivers. We stayed on a luxury houseboat - a converted rice boat with two double cabins and three staff. Food was great and they even went into a nearby village to buy us a bottle of Indian wine! This is excellent but costs more than the meals themselves! For example today's lunch cost 65 rupees (less than a pound) but our wine last night cost 800 R. We had a very relaxing day on the boat away from the sightseeing and the towns but there was no air conditioning in the cabins so we didn't sleep so well. We are now in Kochi and we return here on our way back from Bangaram. Kochi is a large and growing industrial and modern city with a growing port for containers. IT and tourism figure greatly in the local economy; the latter especially in Kerala as a whole. Kerala is very popular both with Indian and international tourists as the landscape is rich and luscious, with many paddy fields on the plains and the backwaters themselves are very scenic. We had an interesting visit to a spice garden and saw many spices growing and Iain got attacked by mozzies! Spice is still a major export with tea, coffee and rubber - the tea plantations especially were extensive on the hillsides as we travelled to Kochi. We go to Ooty tomorrow which is in the major tea growing area and higher so should be less humid! It is obvious that Kerala is more prosperous than most of India and it also boasts the highest literacy rate of 97%. It is even more obvious here that Chistianity is the major religion which is surprising given that the Kerala government is Communist. Apparently they take turns in government every five years so the Communist government is tolerant of different views and faiths. That's all for now but we'll try and post in Mysore before we disappear to Bangaram; if not it will be when we return to Kochi en route for Hanoi. All our love - Ann and Iain